


Beetlejuice: the Maitlands’ Curse

by GothicDeetz



Category: Beetlejuice (1988)
Genre: Adopted Children, Alternate Universe, Anger, Anger Management, Cross-Posted on Wattpad, Curses, Dead People, Demons, Enemies, Families of Choice, Family, Father Figures, Fights, Found Family, Gen, Ghosts, Mother Figures, Multi, Novel, Reveal, Revenge, Spoilers, Tags Contain Spoilers, Talking, Talking To Dead People, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-01
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:00:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25020538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GothicDeetz/pseuds/GothicDeetz
Summary: (This story is based off the alternate ending of the movie).Ghost couple Adam and Barbara Maitland have the one thing that they both wished for since before their deaths: a family. Lydia is now their very own daughter, the custody of whom having been given to the two ghosts by her real dad and stepmom before they moved back to New York.Things were going well for the family of three, at least until a curse befalls the Maitlands.Who’s behind this curse? And why do they want their revenge on the Maitlands?
Relationships: Adam Maitland/Barbara Maitland, Beetlejuice & Lydia Deetz & Adam Maitland & Barbara Maitland, Lydia Deetz & Adam Maitland & Barbara Maitland
Comments: 9
Kudos: 10





	1. Living Life to its Fullest

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoy this story. Comments and kudos are appreciated.

Lydia Deetz had everything she could ever ask for in life. Sure her real dad and stepmom moved back to New York and left her to live with the Maitlands in Winter River, Connecticut, but she didn’t mind. She loved the Maitlands just as much as she loved her real dad and her stepmom. They may be a great distance apart from her but she still loved them. And, to be fair, they had frequent phone calls to check up on one another and make sure everything was okay where they were.

The Maitlands had essentially adopted Lydia as their own daughter right before Charles and Delia moved back up to New York and that’s because the Deetz couple gave custody of Lydia to the Maitlands. Frankly, the two ghosts were ecstatic to finally be able to raise a child of their own and they couldn’t wait for their relationship with the teenager to grow. And they also couldn’t wait to see her grow. And, intheir heads, they could imagine all the fun things that they would get to do as a family of three.

However, what they didn’t know was that something terrible was about to happen to them soon.

* * *

Lydia biked home from school as she usually did, a smile creeping across her face as she waited to give her ghostly guardians her usual greeting when she came home. On the way, she’d told her adoptive second cousin, Barbara’s cousin Jane, that she would call her dad and stepmom in the city in a few hours when asked about them, and continued on her way home.

She stopped her bike at the very bottom of the driveway of the big, White house that she lived in with her adoptive ghost parents and began to wheel her bike into the garage before moving to climb up the front steps and opened the front door of the house, heading inside and closing it behind her. She put her school bags down on a bench that lined the entrance hallway and entered the kitchen to see if her adoptive ghost parents were there.

Sure enough, they were. Barbara was busy making cookies and Adam was sitting at the kitchen island reading the newspaper that Lydia had gotten for him on her way home from school the day before. Barbara heard Lydia’s footsteps sound in the kitchen and she turned to look at her with a smile on her face.

“Hi, sweetheart. How was school?” Barbara greeted the teenager as she left the cookies to make themselves, sitting next to her husband and motioning for Lydia to sit down across from them.

“Good. It was good. Except for the fact that my stupid math teacher assigned us way too much homework to do over the weekend. I can’t take it anymore,” said Lydia, a grumpy tone to her voice.

Barbara made and levitated a plate of cookies over to the center of the kitchen island and placed them all down. “Aw, sweetheart. You only have two more years at the School for Girls and then you’ll be going to high school. How exciting is that?”

Lydia grabbed a warm cookie from the plate and groaned.

“That’s not the problem, Barb!” she said through a mouthful of cookie, her voice a bit muffled.

“Then what is?” the female ghost cocked her head to the side, eyeing her adopted daughter with concern.

“THE HOMEWORK, BARBARA! THE PROBLEM IS THE HOMEWORK! WHY IS THERE SO MUCH?!” Lydia face planted into the table and Barbara reached over, running a hand through the teenager’s medium length Black hair.

“There’s no problem with that. I’m sure you’ll get all your homework done by sundown on Sunday evening,” comfortingly said Barbara.

“Gee...thanks for the help, Barb!” Lydia sarcastically said as she lifted her head off the table.

“Don’t be that sarcastic, Lydia, sweetheart,” Adam spoke up, deciding to have a say in this.

Lydia turned to him. “I wasn’t being sarcastic, Adam.”

“Your tone of voice towards Barbara suggested otherwise.” Adam turned his attention back to the newspaper that now lay on the table and he picked it up again, continuing to read it.

“So, anyway,” Barbara, deciding to change the subject, spoke up. “Did you do well on that science test, Lydia?”

“No. I got another C.”

“Seriously? Another C?”

Lydia nodded. “Yep. Another C.”

“And how well did you do on your math test?” asked Adam.

“Another A!” announced Lydia excitedly.

“You seem to be getting more good grades in math than you do in any other subject in school, Lydia,” commented Barbara with a laugh and a smile. “Are you some sort of math whiz.”

“I’m not a math whiz, Barbara. I’m just good at math.”

“So...a math whiz?” asked Adam.

“Fine!” Lydia sarcastically said. “I’m a math whiz. Now, can I go upstairs and get a start on my homework. Call me down for dinner when it’s ready!”

“You can go upstairs, Lydia,” saidBarbara. “And yes, we’ll call you down for dinner when it’s ready.”

“Thank you!” Lydia gave both of her adoptive parents a hug and rushed upstairs to do her homework, unaware, like her adoptive parents, of what was about to happen.


	2. Dinner and a Curse

Six pm, dinner time, Barbara was in the kitchen making a delicious spaghetti meal for three whilst her husband, sat at the counter, picked up a magazine Lydia had been asked to go out and get him an hour or so ago. Barbara used her powers to scoop the spaghetti into three waiting bowls and moved them over to the counter.

“Adam, hon, could you call Lydia down? Tell her it’s dinner time?”

Adam looked up at the sound of her voice and said, “Okay!”

He put his brand new magazine face down on the counter (Away from his bowl of spaghetti, obviously), and stood up to head over to the bottom of the stairs to call his and Barbara’s adoptive and nonbiological daughter down for her dinner.

“Lydia! Dinnertime!”

“Coming!” she shouted back.

She exited her room and came rushing down the stairs at full speed, jumping into Adam’s arms as she excitedly jumped off the last two stairs (She was lucky that he was light). He hefted her up onto his shoulders and carried her into the kitchen, all the while laughing. Barbara looked up, smiled, and laughed, also a bit enamored the the silliness and fun that her husband and adopted daughter were having together. Adam used his powers to levitate a smilingLydia off of his shoulders and sat her down in a chair (It didn’t matter which one, all three chairs at the counter had steaming hot bowls of spaghetti sitting in front of them.

“I’m having spaghetti for dinner?” asked Lydia, excitedly.

Barbara nodded. “Mhm. Now, eat up.”

“Thank you, guys.” Lydia smiled and reached over, giving her adoptive parents a hug each (She made sure not to knock over her spaghetti).

After dinner, and after Lydia went upstairs to get her night clothes on, the family of three settled down into three separate armchairs in the living room and began to read silently (It was one of their favorite hobbies to do during the evening, it provided the three of them a chance to escape their troubles (If there were any for the day)).

A malicious laugh rumbled through the living room halfway through their little reading session and the family of three tensed, putting down their books andstanding together as they backed up against a nearby wall. That laugh sounded familiar to them and they knew exactly who it belonged to.

“Betelgeuse!” Barbara growled. “Show yourself! I know you’re there!”

Another laugh. “You’re all wrong, Babs. For I cannot show myself. I am still in the afterlife, my voice is all that’s in your house right now. Did you know I could throw my voice all the way into the living world from where I am currently in the afterlife?”

“Get out, Betelgeuse!” snarled Adam.

“Ah, Ah, Ah, you not hear what I just said?” Betelgeuse’s voice replied as it came close to Adam’s ear. It shifted to Lydia’s ear, lowering so that the Maitlands didn’t hear what he was about to say. “Say my name three times or your beloved adoptive parents get cursed.”

“I am not saying your name three times, you jerk! And the Maitlands certainly aren’t getting cursed!” Lydia spat. Her eyes widened then narrowed as thevoice of her and her adoptive parents’ enemy drifted away from her.

“Have it your way, then!” sneeredBetelgeuse’s voice with another malicious laugh filling the air.

“What do you want, you monster!” spat an angered Adam and Barbara in unison.

“You’ll see for yourself!” The voice went quiet for a moment then Adam and Barbara began to glow, lifting into the air just a few feet above Lydia’s head. Almost as quickly as it happened, the glows disappeared and the Maitlands were lowered back down towards the ground.

Lydia, who had been huddled in a corner and shivering and shaking, managed to recompose herself and rushed over to her adoptive parents as quickly as she could, hugging them tightly and melting into their embrace as they hugged her back.

“What on earth was that?” asked a nervous Lydia as she pulled away from her adoptive parents and looked them in the eyes, seeing herself looking equally nervous and worried for them in them.

“We don’t know, sweetheart.” Barbara placed a hand on the teenager’s shoulder in comfort. “Maybe you-know-who has some answers for us.” She nodded knowingly to Adam and winked. Adam knew what to do.

“EXPLAIN YOURSELF, BETELGEUSE!” growled out Adam in pure rage.

“That was a curse,” Betelgeuse’s voice spoke up again, having not been heard for a total of five minutes. “I quietly explained to little Lydia that either she say my name three times in a row or your sorry asses get cursed. What kind of curse it may be, I can’t tell you myself. You’ll just have to consult your copy of the Handbook for the Recently Deceased to figure it out your sorry selves.”

“Betelgeuse! I don’t care that we’ve been cursed by you! Once we get ourselves rid of it, we will personally see to it that you are beaten the moment we find you!” snapped Barbara.

“Ah, Ah, Ah, no threats, Babs.”

“That. Wasn’t. A. Threat. You. Jerk. That. Was. A. Swear!” Barbara hissed.

“Whatever!” They couldn’t see it, but, in the afterlife, Betelgeuse was rolling his eyes sarcastically. “Once I feel like you’ve read through the Handbook and figured out exactly what this curse really is, then we’ll have another talk.” The voice of Betelgeuse faded into thin air before any one of his enemies could say anything.

They looked nervously at one another, not knowing what to say for a few minutes.

Barbara was the first to break the moment of silence, “Right, we can sort this whole curse thing out. We just need to consult the Handbook first.”

The three of them looked at the copy of the Handbook resting on the coffee table. They knew, now, that reading was going to take a while.

But they could get through it, right?


	3. What’s the Curse?

They sat on the couch, the Handbook for the Recently Deceased sitting open in Barbara's lap. It had taken them forever to get to the chapter on curses and after, half an hour of flipping through the Handbook, the Maitlands were figuratively tired.

Lydia had fallen asleep within ten minutes of her adoptive parents looking through the Handbook, Adam leading her upstairs to her bedroom and her bed so that she could have a small nap (They knew it would most likely last an hour, as she would come downstairs and spend some time with them before officially going to bed for the night. Her would kiss her adoptive parents good night and head to bed whilst the Maitlands went up to the attic. They didn't mind staying up all night, it gave them an opportunity to keep an ear out for Lydia in case she had a bad dream and woke up suddenly with a scream.

She had woken up at eight thirty in the evening after a much needed two hour long nap. Trudging downstairs with a pillow in hand, Lydia made her way over into the living room and sat herself down on the couch. Right in between her adoptive parents.

"Oh, Lydia, you're up! Have a nice nap?"

"No..." the teenager admitted, sadly looking down towards the ground. "I had another bad dream."

"Let me guess? About Betelgeuse?" asked Adam.

"No." Lydia shook her head. "It delved more into your curse. It was a couple months after. I lost my ability to see you guys. I don't want that to happen. I don't want to not be able to see you."

"Oh, sweetheart," said Barbara as she put down the Handbook and reached over to give Lydia a hug followed by Adam. "We all know that's not going to happen. We won't let it. We'll get this curse thing sorted out before then. We promise."

"T-thank you," Lydia said, melting into her adoptive parents' cold embrace.

"Now," said Barbara with a smile. She and Adam let go of Lydia and she picked up their copy of the Handbook. "Shall we read on and figure out what exactly this curse is?"

Adam and Lydia nodded.

Barbara smiled even more and the three of them looked back down towards the Handbook for the Recently Deceased.

"The name curse," a confused Barbara read out loud. "What on earth is that?"

"That must be what you-know-who has," said Adam out of surprise.

"Well, let's read on and find out," said Barbara. "The name curse, people or ghosts who are under this curse cannot say their own name."

"So that's one curse I think that he's under, huh? I wonder if he's under more than one curse?" Adam thought out loud.

"No," said Barbara. "I think that's the only one. It does say something about summoning those under this curse in its paragraph."

"Right. What other curses are there?"

"Well, there's the invisible to the living's eye curse. I think it affects ghosts that are connected to living beings." They looked nervously over at Lydia, who had moved to sit across from them and she gave them a similar look.

"What else is there?" asked Adam.

"There's one more, I think," Barbara said, flipping the page of the Handbook. "Yes! I was right! The vanishing curse. It's similar to exorcism but much much worse. I think it's time we had another talk with Betelgeuse and see what the curse is. This time, we HAVE to summon him inside the house. We can't just talk to his voice now, can we?"

"Barb? Are you serious?"

"Super serious." Barbara shook some loose strands of her curly, dark Brown hair out of her eyes. "Lydia?"

'I can't believe that I'm going to do this,' Lydia quietly thought to herself as she stood up and moved to the center of the room. She took a deep breath and said, "Betelgeuse! Betelgeuse! Betelgeuse!"

He appeared, in all his hated glory, right beside Lydia in the center of the living room and smirked as he tried to reach for Lydia. She moved away from him and Barbara grabbed him by the shoulders, slamming him up against a nearby wall.

"Okay!" she growled. "We read through the Handbook, you jerk! Now, what's the curse?"


End file.
